


The Type Who Doesn't Burn

by cedarbranch



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-04-19
Updated: 2020-04-19
Packaged: 2021-03-01 21:55:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,606
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23694241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cedarbranch/pseuds/cedarbranch
Summary: Most people who come to work at the Institute do so for a reason. Gerry had never really thought to wonder what Michael’s was.(In which the Spiral is not the only power to mark Michael Shelley.)
Relationships: Gerard Keay/Michael, Gerard Keay/Michael Shelley
Comments: 16
Kudos: 199





	The Type Who Doesn't Burn

**Author's Note:**

> you ever wonder how gerry knew exactly how to pull andrea nunis out of the lonely?
> 
> (title from [dread in my heart](https://youtu.be/xGJdYxjkVBU) by mother mother)

Gertrude slides a folder across her desk to where Gerry is sitting. He takes it, kicking his feet up onto her desk. She just gives him a look. Oh, well. He tried.

Gerry takes his feet down and opens the folder. Inside is a photo of a crumbling old castle and a few statements. “What’s this?” he asks.

“Our next trip,” Gertrude replies. “Have your things ready on Friday morning. We’ll leave straight from the Institute.”

Gerry skims over the statements. Something about getting lost, something about wandering spooky old halls that never end… ”Spiral?” he guesses. 

“No. Keep reading.”

Gerry sighs and looks a little closer. The one on top is from a girl who’d gotten lost in the countryside and found herself before the castle. It drew her in, and as cold and stark the place was, it was almost a comfort. She didn’t have to speak, or even think. The click of her footsteps was the only sound for miles, and when she touched the old stone walls, they felt like they could be home to a ghost like her…

Gerry looks up. “The Lonely,” he says. It’s not a guess this time. 

Gertrude nods. “There’ve been several reports of people going in and not coming out. It’s clearly a gateway into the Forsaken, but it could be something more, especially given the volume of statements. I don’t remember the Lonely’s followers ever attempting a ritual during my tenure as Head Archivist. I’d prefer to head them off now if they’re starting to get ideas.”

“Right.” Gerry resumes flipping through the folder and makes a mental note to take home some extra statements on the Lonely. He hasn’t had many encounters with it—it’s subtler than the powers he usually deals with. It’s one thing to track down books that go around violently killing people, but it’s another to hunt for a power that specializes in not wanting to be found. 

“Oh, and one more thing,” says Gertrude. “We’re bringing Michael.”

Gerry sighs. 

“He needs to get used to traveling,” Gertrude says, her tone carrying an unspoken warning. “This is the ideal trip to bring him on—there’s much less chance of him dying a brutal death than usual.”

That’s true. Still, Gerry doesn’t like it when they bring Michael. He doesn’t know why Gertrude sometimes insists, but her stubbornness on the matter isn’t a good omen. Whatever the reason is, it probably spells out trouble for Michael, and Michael doesn’t deserve that. He’s a good person, and Gerry’s actually grown quite fond of him. 

He never should’ve started working at the Institute. But that’s what the Institute does, isn’t it? It just takes good people and chews them up, and when it spits them back out, they’re either dead or unrecognizable. 

Gerry gets up and walks out the door. He’s got reading to do.

***

The castle sits before them, an imposing hunk of rock against the rolling landscape.

“Huh,” Michael says. “It’s actually quite pretty, isn’t it?”

“So what exactly are we looking for, Gertrude?” Gerry asks.

“Anything beyond what we’ve already read in the statements,” says Gertrude, surveying the castle with hard eyes. Michael trails alongside her like a lost puppy. Gerry has to look away. “Hopefully, we won’t find anything, and we’ll be able to write this off as another malevolent old building. But if there’s a heart in this place…” Her hand passes over her bag. There’s about a 95% chance she has some kind of explosive tucked away in there. Gerry gives her a bit of extra space. 

He really hopes there aren’t any avatars lurking around. He can’t imagine an avatar of the Lonely would be that scary, but he’d still prefer for today to be a relatively easy job instead of an existential battle. 

They go inside, and the entry hall splits off in two directions. “Which way?” Michael asks. 

At first glance, nothing about the place seems too off. They’ll probably have to walk for a while before they start getting into the dangerous parts. Gerry shrugs. “We could split up and check both.”

Michael frowns. “A-are you sure that’s a good idea? I just don’t think we should—it could be dangerous, I-I don’t want anyone to get into trouble on their own.” He tilts his head at Gertrude. Gerry resists the urge to roll his eyes.

“It’ll be fine,” he says. “If you’re that scared, you can come with me.”

Michael flushes and opens his mouth to speak, but Gertrude cuts him off. “That sounds like a marvelous idea. Thank you, Gerard.” She checks her watch. “We can reconvene here in fifteen minutes. If you two aren’t back by then, I’ll go looking.” She nods shortly. Gerry nods back, and she walks off down the hallway. Gerry starts in the opposite direction. 

Michael hurries after him. “Gerard,” he says under his breath. “Are you sure this is a good idea? We have no idea what’s in this place, i-if something goes after Gertrude—”

“It’ll be fine. We won’t go too far, and she can call for help if she needs us.”

“What if she can’t?” Michael argues. “You know how some of these statements are, sometimes you can’t just pick up a phone and call—”

“She’ll be fine,” Gerry says. “She can take care of herself.”

“But she’s—“

“Michael,” Gerry snaps. “I wouldn’t have let her go off on her own if I thought she’d be in danger, all right? I’ve been doing this longer than you, so I’ll thank you to trust my judgement for fifteen minutes.”

Michael flinches. “R-right. Sorry. Let’s just… try and explore this bit quickly.”

Gerry averts his eyes. He feels a little bad for being sharp with Michael—his heart’s in the right place, and he’s doing the best he can. But he has no idea who Gertrude really is. The less he worries about her, the smoother this entire operation will go. And if Michael has to think Gerry’s a prick in order to get that to happen, then so be it. 

They continue down the hall. Michael runs his hand along the wall as they go. Gerry should tell him not to—if he’s the one so concerned about safety, he shouldn’t go touching everything he can get his hands on—but he just walks in silence, his boots clunking against the smooth stone floor. 

“What do you think this place used to be?” Michael asks. 

Gerry shrugs. He doesn’t care what it used to be, only what it is now. Hopefully, they’ll have made it into something entirely new and much less malevolent once they’re done here. 

Michael goes quiet, and they keep walking in silence. The hall begins to curve, and through the occasional crumbling windows, a grassy hillside peers in at them. Gerry keeps one eye on it. It could be his imagination, but it feels like it’s getting colder, the end of the hall a bit too shadowy for his liking. 

Beside him, Michael shivers and stuffs his hands into his coat pockets. “W-we should probably head back soon,” he says. “I think we’ve gone far enough.”

“It hasn’t even been ten minutes yet,” says Gerry.

“I-it hasn’t? I thought it had. It feels like we’ve been in here forever.” Michael’s paler than normal, though Gerry can’t tell if it’s from fear or just the cold. 

“Let's just go a little further,” Gerry says. “Then we can head back.”

Michael nods, his expression distant. Gerry turns his attention back to the walls around them. They can just walk for a few more minutes, make some progress, and then turn around if Michael starts getting jittery. His anxiety tends to be contagious, and Gerry can’t focus on keeping them both calm when he needs to be looking for signs of the Lonely. 

Speaking of which. He looks back over his shoulder, just to make sure, and—yes, he can still see the route they came from. The walls have curved too much for him to be able to make out the entrance, but the path itself is still there. 

Michael grabs onto his arm. Gerry startles and swats his hand away instinctively. “What—”

“Gerard,” Michael hisses. He points up ahead, where a section of the wall has crumbled into itself. Outside, the hillside has grown foggy, and the mist has drifted into the castle. 

Gerry swears under his breath. It could be normal—sometimes weather is just weather, especially out in the country—but nothing in this line of work is ever normal. So what is there to do? There are no avatars in sight, and Gerry can’t imagine they’ll reveal themselves; that wouldn’t be very in-character. There’s nothing to fight. 

The mist keeps curling in, thick and sinister.

“Okay,” says Gerry. “Guess we’re running, then.”

“What?” Michael says, but Gerry has already turned on his heel to run. Michael scrambles after him. 

“What is it?” he asks, panicked. “I-is it alive?”

“It’s bad news is what it is,” Gerry says darkly. “Don’t look behind you.” He doesn’t know if they’ll be able to outrun it, but as long as they can still see, they should have a chance. _Shit_. Michael was right, they should’ve turned back before.

Gerry’s heart pounds. The air has definitely gotten colder. Even as he runs, the chill bites through his coat. Out of the corner of his eye, he can make out a blanket of mist coating the floor just behind them. He picks up the pace, his lungs burning. Michael’s footsteps fall behind his. Their echo lingers in the air longer than it should. 

“Gerard,” Michael gasps. “It’s—it’s almost—”

Gerry skids to a halt.

In front of them, the path branches off in two directions. There hadn’t been two before, had there? “Shit,” he breathes. “Okay, to the right, then—”

He glances over his shoulder, and Michael is gone. 

“ _Shit_ ,” says Gerry. 

The hall is filled to the brim with a rolling mass of fog. Gerry can’t even see the walls anymore, and he gets the feeling that if he reached out to touch, they wouldn’t be there at all. It hasn’t quite reached him. He could still run, make it back to Gertrude and tell her that this place is exactly as dangerous as they’d read. 

But what would she do? You can’t exactly blow up fog, and if they tried to destroy the building itself, then… 

If Michael’s going to die at her hands, it’s not going to be like this. Gerry won’t let it. 

He shoves away the instincts screaming at him not to be such a bloody _moron,_ and steps into the mist. 

It swallows him up almost immediately, engulfing him in white. Gerry turns around. Each direction is indiscernible from the next. He waves a hand in front of his face, but the fog won’t clear. 

Gerry sighs. This place shouldn’t have taken Michael this easily. It’s tempting to just chalk it up to Michael being Michael, but that feels needlessly cruel, especially given the circumstances. The Lonely doesn’t just reach out and _grab_ people often. It plays a subtler game, marking people young, then following them for the rest of their lives, until they walk straight into its open arms. 

Most people who come to work at the Institute do so for a reason. Gerry had never really thought to wonder what Michael’s was. 

But now isn’t the time to start. He didn’t stroll into the Forsaken to wonder; he did it to find Michael. He picks a direction at random and starts walking. As he walks, he wracks his brains for anything he’s read about the Lonely. It deals in isolation; it wants you to feel abandoned, like you’re missing out, like no one’s there. 

“Well, tough,” Gerry mutters. “ _I’m_ here.”

Hopefully that’s enough. Maybe if he can just break through, get Michael to know he’s _not_ alone, they could make it out of this together. 

He pushes forward through the fog, squinting to see through the thick clouds of white. “Michael!” he shouts. “Michael, can you hear me?”

Gerry scowls to himself. Think, think, think. The Lonely isn’t just about being physically alone—it’s mental, too. The fear that no one cares, or that you can’t connect with people. The tricky part is, the people it targets usually _do_ struggle with connection. Who does Michael have? There was Gertrude’s old assistant Emma, but she’s long gone now. There’s Gertrude, but that relationship is so one-sided it’s laughable. Gerry doesn’t know anything about Michael’s family, if they would bring comfort or make things worse. His heart sinks. Fuck. He’s never really thought about it, but he can’t think of a single close friend that Michael has. Are there any?

The thought brings a surge of anger through him. There has to be _someone_ , how could there not be? Fuck the Lonely, and fuck this entire situation—Gerry _cares_ about Michael, god damn it. If things weren’t always so chaotic at the institute, they might even be friends. They still could be. Or maybe… maybe, if Gerry could get his shit together for once in his life, or if he got just a bit more reckless, they could be something more. 

“Michael!” Gerard shouts again. He turns around, the fog flowing around him like a river. He picks a new direction and keeps walking, picking up the pace so he’s jogging through the mist. “Come on,” he mutters. “I know you’re in here, and you’re coming back with me, damn it.” He inhales deeply and tries one more time: “Michael! It’s Gerard, are you there?”

“Gerard?” says a distant voice. 

Gerry’s heart surges into his throat. “Yes!” he yells. “I’m here, where are you?”

“I don’t know,” says Michael. His voice echoes softly. “What are you doing here?”

“Looking for you! I turned around and you were gone, but I can get you back, I promise.” Gerry looks all around, searching for any sign. “Michael?” he asks. 

“You shouldn’t be here,” says Michael. 

Gerry catches the faintest glimpse of a shape through the fog, and he runs without thinking. He stumbles to a halt just behind Michael. He’s sitting on the ground, his back turned to Gerry. Gerry reaches out, tentatively placing a hand on his shoulder. Michael doesn’t move.

“You should go back,” Michael says. “Gertrude’s on her own now.”

“Fuck Gertrude,” Gerry says fiercely. “She can be alone, see if I care. But not you. I’m not letting you stay here.”

Michael laughs. Gerry’s chest clenches. It’s a ghost of what it should be, more breath than anything else. Michael’s laugh is melodic and nasal, scratchy at the edges and perpetually nervous, like he’s scared to let himself fall into unrestrained glee. It’s constantly present, whenever he’s amused or just doesn’t know how to fill the silence. It’s grating, sometimes. But always, no matter what, it’s _felt_. 

Now, it’s lost to an exhale. Even its echo is hollow. 

Gerry sits down next to him. Michael stares off into the distance, his gaze vacant. Gerry touches his shoulder. “Michael,” he says. “You have to come back with me. I came for you, you don’t have to be alone anymore.”

“But I do,” Michael says. His voice is steadier than Gerry’s ever heard it. “That’s just how it is, with me.” 

“Not if I have anything to say about it. Michael, look at me. Come on,” Gerry says, desperation beginning to bleed into his voice. Michael has to listen, Gerry has to find a way to make him—he can’t have done all this for nothing. “I’m right here, I swear.”

“Yes, you are,” Michael says softly. “I’m sorry. I know you didn’t want to be.”

“You didn’t either.”

Michael finally looks at Gerry. A faint smile plays at his lips. “I don’t think that’s true,” he says. “I can be myself here. I don’t have to worry about anyone else.”

“But other people are still worrying about _you_ ,” Gerry says firmly. “You can’t just give in to this, okay? Even if there’s no one else, I’m here, and I want you back in the real world, even if it’s hard to be out there. We can get through it together.”

Michael shrugs listlessly. “You can find someone else,” he says. 

“I don’t _want_ anyone else.”

Michael sighs. “I’m sorry, Gerard,” he says, and the sadness would almost sound real, if it wasn’t so far away. 

“Gerry,” Gerry blurts out.

“What?”

Gerard takes Michael’s hand. “You should call me Gerry,” he says. “It’s what my… I’ve always wanted my friends to call me that.”

Michael stares at Gerry, really looking at him now, instead of just through him. “A-and… you want me to?” he asks slowly.

“Yup,” says Gerry. He squeezes Michael’s hand. “What do you think? That sound good to you?”

“I… sure, i-if that’s really what you want. I-I just didn’t realize, I thought… I don’t know.” The echo has fallen away from his voice, and the color begins to fade back into his watery blue eyes. Gerry smiles. 

“Yeah, well. I’m not leaving my friend behind.” Gerry stands up, and Michael allows himself to be pulled up as well. As he stands up, the fog pulls away from him. The air around them is fresh and clear. Michael watches it retreat with wide eyes. 

“Gerard—Gerry,” he says. He clutches Gerry’s hand like a lifeline. “I-I don’t know how to…” He gulps, and once the words start coming out, they don’t stop: “I just feel safer here, a-and it doesn’t hurt so much, but I don’t want to be on my own, I—

“Hey, shh,” Gerry says soothingly. “You don’t have to explain. I’m here, and I’m going to get us home.”

“How?” Michael asks. 

That’s a very good question. Gerry hadn’t really thought about it in advance, but… 

“The same way I found you,” he says. 

He leads Michael through the Forsaken, focusing on the feeling of Michael’s fingers tight around his own, a single point of warmth in the cold, dank emptiness. He thinks about Michael, and how he’s always afraid without even knowing what he should really be afraid of, and how he never stops working in spite of it all. He always insists on bandaging Gerry’s wounds if he comes to the Institute hurt, and then he rambles about nothing while he does, his touch gentler than anything Gerry’s ever known. His jokes are just as terrible as Gerry’s, and when they start riffing off each other, the look on Gertrude’s face is always so tired he can’t help but laugh, truly and fully. 

He thinks about just how much he wants Michael around, and the fierceness of that feeling should scare him. But now, it’s exactly what he needs. 

Michael’s gasp is what alerts him. Gerry shakes himself, breaking his focus. “What?” he asks.

But he doesn’t need Michael to answer. He can see for himself—the clouds of the Forsaken have faded away, and outside the castle, the radiant light of afternoon shines down on them. 

“Holy shit,” Gerry says, awestruck. “I can’t believe that actually worked.”

“I can’t either,” Michael says. Gerry grins at him, and he flushes, looking away. “Gerry, I… I’m sorry. I don’t know what that place was, but I know it was dangerous, and I’m sorry you had to go in for me, I never should have—”

“I didn’t _have_ to do anything,” says Gerry. “I did it ‘cause I wanted to.”

“Still,” Michael says firmly. “Thank you.”

Gerry swallows. For some reason, his reply sticks in his throat; it’s hard to speak, with the full force of Michael’s quietly grateful gaze turned on him. “‘Course,” he manages. 

Michael gives him a small smile. He rocks forward and back on his heels, averting his eyes again. The sunlight turns his hair golden. 

Gerry wants to kiss him. Fuck, Gerry _really_ wants to kiss him. He’d been holding that thought back the entire time he had Michael clinging to his hand, but now it’s suddenly there, insistent and uncompromising and _fuck_ , he could just lean in and— 

“Oh, there you two are,” Gertrude says brusquely. “I’ve been waiting. Did you find anything of interest?”

Gerry jumps back. “No,” he says, strangled even to his own ears. He takes a moment to collect himself before going on: “Nothing but a fucking death trap, that is.”

“Yes, I presumed as much,” Gertrude says calmly. “I did some digging of my own, and fortunately enough, it seems that this place won’t be the site of a ritual. It is one of many of its kind.” 

Gerry doesn’t know whether to cuss her out or laugh. That’s Gertrude for you. “What are we going to do about it, then?” he asks.

“Oh, nothing in particular,” she says casually. “You and I can come back another day.”

Which is, of course, her code word for _blow it up_. That sounds like a good plan, now that Michael and Gerry aren’t inside it. Gerry would really like to see this place in ruins.

“Are you all right?” Michael asks, looking Gertrude up and down. “I-it didn’t get to you, did it?”

“No, not at all. I’m glad to see the two of you made it out all right as well.” Gertrude smiles briefly. “I suppose that concludes a rather unpleasant day. Shall we?”

“Yeah. Let’s get out of here,” Gerry mutters. He starts walking down the long gravel pathway. As he goes, Michael catches his hand and laces their fingers together. 

Gerry’s heart skips a beat, and he doesn’t let go.


End file.
